theonlyD800inthehameau
Photography by theonlydeadheadinthehameau
Both Sides Now
Posted on November 24, 2021
A clever way of getting an all-round view of this elaborately decorative pendant, on display in the Victoria & Albert Museum (‘The V&A’) in London.
The kitchen of the castle
Posted on October 25, 2019
This surprisingly modest old kitchen is on display at a Chateau in the Dordogne departement of France.
Cee’s Black & White Photo Challenge: Things found in a kitchen
Tuesday Photo Challenge: Key
Posted on August 21, 2019
Frank’s challenge this week has the theme of key. Rather rarer than the locks or keyholes that they marry up with, but I did find this impressive set, which must once have belonged to the chatelaine, in an old house in the Dordogne which is now a museum.
A double helping of biscuits
Posted on January 9, 2019
Based in Nantes, the French biscuit manufacturers Lu (Lefevre Utile) are long-established and happily still producing, even if not in their original factory. Their ‘petits écoliers’ chocolate biscuits – especially the plain chocolate version – cannot be recommended too highly.
Apart from the product itself, Lu’s publicity material is also iconic. This image is of a pair of their advertising signs from around the turn of the last century, and was taken in the Chateau des Ducs museum in Nantes.
How to shear a sheep
Posted on November 7, 2018
Cee wants to see some images of tools this week. I spotted this in the Museum in Perigueux.
As the card states, it’s a pair of scissors for shearing sheep. They’ve been in the museum since 1914, but date from some time in the late 19th century at a guess. They are made of iron, no doubt by a village blacksmith.
Nowadays, sheep are sheared using electric clippers, which is obviously a lot quicker than this traditional method – although only a few years ago we watched our neighbour and his wife shearing one of their sheep with a pair quire similar to these.
Next year, the World Sheep-Shearing Championship (yes, there is such a thing) will be held in the nearby town of Le Dorat. I sense a major photo opportunity.
Tuesday Photo Challenge: Old
Posted on January 23, 2018
This week, Frank at Dutch Goes The Photo! has returned to the theme of ‘Old’.
As this year is, of course, the centenary of the end of World War I, this image seems appropriate. It is a French Army helmet of the period, now housed in the Museum at the Chateau des Ducs in Nantes.
W is for Wrought Iron
Posted on May 19, 2017
This wrought iron balcony dates from about 1740 and is now on display in the Chateau des Ducs museum in Nantes. The pattern is complex enough on its own but the shadows add a further dimension.
Tuesdays of Texture: Sea Chest
Posted on May 16, 2017
Lots of textures in this detail of the ornate iron lock of a wooden sea chest, found in the Chateau des Ducs Museum in the French city of Nantes.
Antique
Posted on July 22, 2016
Finding something over 50 years old for this week’s edition of Cee’s Black & White Photo Challenge isn’t the hard part. Just looking in the mirror solves that problem.
However, to spare all of us the ordeal of a self-portrait, here are three photographs taken in a chateau in Sarlat, which is set up as it might have looked in the sevententh century (way more than fifty years ago).
This old book (Proceedings of the Committee on French Africa – riveting stuff) is artfully placed on a desk, but I liked the cropped version showing the book itself and the (also artfully placed) reading glasses:
Sepia seemed the most appropriate colour cast for this formal dining-room:
But my favourite image is this one. A quasi-impressionist view through some very old window-panes, the antiquity of which is attested by the fact that they’re full of bubbles, showing that they were made in the days before glaziers had mastered the techniques of producing absolutely clear glass in mass-market quantities:
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